


An Avvar Love Story: INTRODUCTIONS

by Mikkeneko



Series: AN AVVAR LOVE STORY [1]
Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Avvar beliefs and customs, Avvar!Hawke, BB Garrett Meets a Spirit, Garrett is a total spirit nerd, Gen, Post-Legacy, he's doomed to be very disappointed by Peace, non-Chantry spirituality, that guy's kind of a dick
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-21
Updated: 2015-09-21
Packaged: 2018-04-22 17:08:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,681
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4843505
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mikkeneko/pseuds/Mikkeneko
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three times in Garrett Hawke's life that he encountered spirits, and how they shaped his view of the world.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Wisdom

Gherlen's Pass  
1 Cassus, 9:10 Dragon

* * *

 

The inside of the tent is dark, stuffy and close. It smells bad, like woodsmoke and old leather, rotting food, and too many people in close quarters, but it's still better than being outside, where the wind cuts right through Garrett's coat and gloves to bite his skin.

Garrett is five and a half years old and he still doesn't understand why they've come here, high up in the mountains in the middle of winter. He knows his mother doesn't like it – she fusses with an extra brittle edge to her voice that means she's really unhappy, at the cold and the wind and the ice, at the food and the dark and smelly tents they have to stay in now.  _Primitive_ , that's the word she says. But his father wanted to come here, wanted really,  _really_ badly to come here, and so they came. And Garrett still doesn't know why.

He steps away from the tent entrance, letting the flap of heavy felt fall closed behind him, cutting off the glaring white light that shone from the snowy ground. His eyes still aren't fully adjusted and so he waits, breathing in the smoky reek and listening to the sounds of people beyond: shuffling footsteps, breathing and coughs, and words he doesn't understand.

"Dad?" he whispers as his eyes start to adjust, piercing the gloom beyond. "Dad, are you here?"

There's no sign of his father in the tent, just shadowy adult bodies he doesn't recognize and doesn't care about. But there's doorway to another room further in, and isn't that funny, tents with rooms in them, and so Garrett steps forward and reaches for the heavy leather hide covering the door.

One of the grown-ups blocks him, an old woman with long dark hair streaked with white twisted up in a strange hairdo on her head, tangled through with feathers and bones. Her face and arms and chest are streaked with paint, and it makes her look fierce as she frowns down at him and shakes her head.

"You don't want to go in there, child," she said. "The ritual is not yet done."

"I want to see my father," Garrett says boldly.

The old woman looks down at him for a long moment, and Garrett starts to squirm. But she's not his mother, she can't tell him what to do, and what he wants to do is go into the next room and see his father.

"Very well," she says, and stands aside. Pleased with his unexpected victory over the mysterious grown-ups that rule his world, Garrett rushes through the door – and stops dead.

The next room isn't dark at all; he can see the walls and the floor, painted in all directions with crazy lines of dark color, lit up by a blue-white glow that flickers like a silent fire. Set in points around the circle are some things Garrett doesn't recognize – candles, whose flames are sunk to such tiny pinpricks that they hardly let out any light at all, heaps of fabric, and hard white things that reflect the blue glow. But it's not the bones that make Garrett stop; he's seen bones before, helping to catch and skin rabbits and sometimes goats for dinner.

The glow is coming from his father.

His father is sitting in the middle of the room, in the exact center of the looping circles, cross-legged and with his hands folded on his knees. All over his skin are zig-zagging lines of blue light, that seem to shift and fade and move even as he looks at them. The brightest light of all comes from his eyes, and when his father turns his head to look at Garrett standing in the doorway, they are completely taken over by shining pools of fire.

Garrett stands frozen, too frightened to approach, not daring to run. He's afraid that if he runs away, he'll never see his father again; so he swallows his fear of the light, puts one foot forward and says in a quavering voice, "D…dad?"

"No, child," his father says, and the voice is deep and rumbling, like the roar of a river falling into a waterfall far below the cliff. It's not his father's voice at all. "I am not he."

The voice is scary, but at least it's a voice that's talking, speaking words that he understands; and so Garrett is made bold, enough to finish the half-step he'd taken. "Where is my father?"

"He is within," the echoing voice answers him. It's a scary voice, but it doesn't sound angry, and it doesn't tell him to go away. "He seeks answers, which I give when I can to those who ask. I am Wisdom."

"Will my father come back soon?" Garrett says nervously.

"Yes, presently," the spirit answers, and Garrett blows out a relieved breath. "I do not intend to linger on the mortal plane for long. When your father returns, he will be as he was before, if hopefully a bit wiser."

Somewhat reassured, Garrett takes another step into the room and sits down on a stack of leather mats, crossing his legs the same way his father's are crossed. He doesn't really want to leave yet; this is where his father is, or will be, and besides, the rest of the camp is boring. He stares at the glowing lines in open curiosity. "What are you?"

"I am a spirit. I live in the world of dreams," Wisdom replies. "The wise woman called me here at your father's request. He sought advice that he could not get from anyone on the worldly plane, and hoped that he might get answers no one else could give."

"What answers?" Garrett wants to know. Up until today, he would have said that his father was the smartest person anywhere.

Wisdom doesn't answer for a long moment, and Garrett begins to squirm again. This cross-legged position isn't really comfortable, he doesn't know how his father is sitting still so long. The blue-fire eyes seem to bore into him, and Garrett wonders if maybe he said the wrong thing.

At last, though, Wisdom speaks. "A few years ago, before you were born, your father was called upon to perform an act that was both great and terrible," he says. "He did so, because he felt he had no other choice, but he had doubts. He wished to know if his decisions were the right ones, whether he had done something that would forever scar the world, and whether there was more he must do to set things right."

"Great and… terrible?" Garrett frowns. "I don't understand. Great means good, and terrible means bad. How can something be good and bad at the same time?"

"Many of the greatest deeds are also the most terrible ones. The acts that change the world, that shape history, are rarely without consequence. But it is still worth doing, if the good consequences outweigh the evil. And many times a terrible act must be done so that an even greater evil cannot to come to pass." Wisdom studies him again, his expression blank and stern under those glowing eyes. "Do you understand?"

"No," Garrett admits.

Wisdom gives him a slow nod. "Then remember, and there may come a time someday when you do understand."

Garrett decides he likes Wisdom. The spirit is a little bit scary, but he's not mean, so that makes him exciting. And he talks to Garrett seriously, not using baby talk or telling him to run along and play. Garrett doesn't know what all the big words mean yet, but it makes him feel grown-up to be talked to like a grown-up. "You're a nice spirit," he tells Wisdom.

Wisdom inclines his head. "I am," he says unselfconsciously. "But not all spirits are as kindly disposed to mortals as I. You would do well to have caution in your dealings with the Fade."

"I'll try," Garrett promises him.

They sit in silence for a little bit longer, Garrett watching the glowing lines of fire move across his father's skin in fascination. It's really pretty, like when his father uses magic, and he can't wait till he grows up and can do it too.

"The time has come for me to depart," Wisdom announces suddenly. "Farewell, child. Learn caution and wisdom, and you will grow strong."

"Okay," Garrett says. "Good-bye, Wisdom!"

The blue-white light shines more brightly, seeming to blaze from the inside of his father's skin, and Garrett can't help but be nervous again. Someone moves from behind him – it's the old woman from the other room, although Garrett didn't see her come in – and raises her staff high, chanting in words that Garrett doesn't understand.

The roaring-waterfall sound is louder now, though Wisdom is no longer speaking; all at once there's a sound like thunder, and the blue light bursts forth from his father's body and swirls wildly around the inside of the painted circle. The old woman's voice rises to a shout, and with another crack of thunder, the light is gone.

It's dark inside the tent now that the blue fire is gone, with only the burned-down candles giving any light. Garrett can only see his father's silhouette, as he slumps forward onto his hands. His father takes a breath – and it's just his voice now, Garrett can tell – and sounds almost like he's crying.

"Dad?" Garrett says carefully, and his father lifts his head.

"Garrett?" he says, sounding surprised. "What are you doing in here?"

Not particularly wanting to get scolded, Garrett fidgets and then shrugs. "I wanted to see you," he mumbles, and then adds, "But instead I met Wisdom. I've never met a spirit before!"

"I'm sorry," his father says. "You – you shouldn't have had to see that, Garrett."

"It's okay." Garrett is more alarmed by seeing his father cry than by anything that came before it. "He was nice. I wasn't scared at all," maybe a little bit of bragging there, but Garrett wants to be brave for his father.

"Good." His father clears his throat, wiping tears away from his cheeks. He stands up slowly, stretching his back, and carefully steps out of the circle; he lets out a little breath of relief when he reaches the other side, for no reason that Garrett can see.

Then his father stumbles to one knee beside him and sweeps him up in a tight hug. His beard presses against the top of Garrett's head, still damp with tears.

Garrett endures the hug for a long minute, but when his father shows no sign of letting him go, he begins to wriggle. "Daaad," Garrett whines. "Come on. I'm not a baby any more."

"That's right, isn't it? You're five years old!" His father pulls back a little bit and tries to smile, though his eyes still shimmer wetly. "You're getting so big… so fast."

"Five  _and a half,"_  Garrett corrects him with a huff. His father should know that. So much for being the smartest man alive. "Is Wisdom going to come back, dad?"

"No. No, I got what I needed from the spirit, and we won't see it again." His father stands up again, and holds out a hand for Garrett to take. "It's time for us to go. We can't stay in the Frostbacks any longer. Let's go break the news to your mother – I'm sure she'll be thrilled."

That cheers Garrett up again – if his mother is happy, he'll be happy, and it will be nice not to have to sleep out in the snow again. "Where are we going?" he asks, skipping ahead until his father's hold on his hand pulls him back. "Can we go to Denerim? Can we see the King? Will I get to see a  _dragon?"_

"Maybe someday," Malcolm says.

* * *

 

~tbc...

 


	2. Peace

Brecilian Passage  
5 Molioris, 9:20 Dragon

* * *

 

The easiest way to find Carver, as always, is just to follow the noise.

Garrett pushes his way through thigh-high undergrowth, dappled sunlight shifting and flowing around him as he tries to stay on the old deer path. The clearing with the wagons is behind him, as are the roads they traveled to reach them in the first place; but if the echoing thwacks of wood on wood and high, childish cursing is any indication, Carver is still somewhere up ahead.

The twins turned ten not long ago, and Carver's nameday present was a wooden training sword. Garrett heartily wishes his parents had waited longer (even if he got  _his_  first training weapons at age nine; he was a lot more mature then than Carver is now) since Carver has not been parted from the thing ever since.

He breaks through the line of brush at the edge of the clearing at last - a perfectly circular glen, floored with clover and surrounded by a ring of white stones. Something about the place makes the hair stand up on his arms, and when he sees Carver on the other side of the clearing - whacking heartily away at one of the trees with his weapon - Garrett rushes forward to grab him and lift him off the ground.

"What are you doing, you idjit?" Garrett exclaims, as Carver yells and thrashes in his arms. "These are the Brecilian Woods! Do you want to piss off some tree spirit and get cursed?"

Carver kicks back at him, and Garrett is forced to let him go unless he wants to put his little brother under some actually serious restraint. Carver rolls away, comes up facing him and points accusingly. "What, so even the  _trees_  get special treatment now?" he screeches.

"What are you talking about?" Garrett exclaims.

"You know what I'm talking about!" Carver shouts, and Garrett can see the tear streaks and red blotches that mean his little brother has been crying. "It's not fair! I break one lousy plate and I get sent to bed without dinner or do extra chores.  _She_  smashes up the whole kitchen and what do Mom and Dad do? Pack up and move halfway across the world to get her a shiny special new  _spirit friend!"_

"Don't be stupid!" Garrett claps a hand over his brother's mouth, glancing around nervously even though the odds of anyone overhearing them are next to nothing.

"This isn't a reward," he hisses, returning his attention to Carver and moving his hand away from his mouth. "Bethany needed help. They had to do  _something_. Did you want them to send her off to the Circle where we'd never see her again?"

He'd heard them discussing it, when arguing round and round in circles in the night. Mother cried; she feared the Circles, feared never seeing her daughter again, but even that alternative seemed better to her than death or worse. Father had paced and shouted, yelling that the Harrowing gave Bethany odds just as bad, with no hope of freedom again afterwards.

"No!" There is real horror on Carver's face at the thought, at the prospect of being separated from his twin; no matter how they bicker, Carver and Bethany have always been inseparable. "Of course not. It's just... it's just not fair!"

Garrett let outs a breath, relieved that Carver's jealousy seems to have petered out. "Life isn't fair, little bro," he said, reaching out to tousle Carver's hair. His younger brother scowls darkly at him, ducking away from the affectionate roughhousing. "Seriously though, stop smashing up the trees," Garrett adds, suddenly dead serious. "I don't want to have to explain to Mom why my little brother was shot up with Dalish arrows."

Carver's face scrunches up in distaste, but he lets the point of his wooden sword drop. Garrett swears he can hear the trees in the clearing breathe a sigh of relief.

* * *

 

The sun is dipping low by the time Garrett returns to the wagons; the last of the red-gold light plays over the dusty canvas sides, picking out the branching motifs of the Elk Clan. Garrett had never known that there were clans of his people this far to the east - the Avvar are scattered, nomadic, but wherever the bones of the world reach up towards the sky, there will the Avvar be.

The Elk Clan manage a tense mutual tolerance with the Dalish elves that also wander the forested slopes of these mountains. His parents had heard of their presence in the region from some elvish traders in the South Reach, and they had been the closest prospect when the Hawke Clan suddenly had urgent need for a shaman.

So far the Elk Clan has been welcoming, if a bit wary - they don't often get visitors from other clans, but the sacred traditions of hospitality still hold fast among them. Their shaman, an elderly man with a shaved head and heavy black eyepaint, disappeared with Malcolm and Bethany into the ritual tent only hours after their arrival.

That was three days ago - and from what Garrett heard eavesdropping at the canvas walls of the tent, the worst is behind them now. They managed to find an amenable spirit, and induced it into Bethany without either of them being harmed; now it is just a matter of waiting, and letting the spirit do its job.

If he's being honest with himself, Garrett has been looking forward to this ever since Bethany's magic manifested. It's been years since he last spoke to a spirit - to Wisdom, wearing his father's face, when he was only a boy - and he's so much better prepared now. The Hawke family spent a winter with the Bear Clan when Garrett was only ten himself, and Malcolm had gotten the shaman of that clan to provide Garrett with a much-needed education.

There had been so much to learn - about history, the fascinating parade of thanes and augurs and huntsmen who made up the tapestry of his people's past. About Korth the Mountain-Father and Hakkon Wintersbreath and the Lady of the Skies and Imhar the Trickster and all the ways that their people must keep their gods, if the gods are also to keep them. About the Land of Dreams, and the spirits who filled it, about their ways and their natures and their powers and their dangers. And, of course, of the ancient and tongue-twisting language of the spirits, which had caused Garrett more trouble than the rest of it put together.

_"Why don't the spirits speak Trade?" Garrett had complained, not even trying to keep the sulky whine out of his voice. The old shaman had only smiled._

_"The spirits speak all the tongues of man, and none," she said. "They do not hear words as we do; they hear your thoughts, and your heart. That is why it is never wise to lie to a spirit, child."_

_Garrett frowned. "But if the language doesn't matter, why do I have to memorize all these words in the old language?" he exclaimed. "Can't I just say "Hi, spirit" in Trade and accomplish the same thing?"_

_"The words are not for the spirit. They are for you," the shaman said severely. "They exist to express formality and respect, and to recognize the great honor that the spirit is doing you by allowing you to address it. Speaking a language apart will help you to never forget to whom it is that you speak."_

He remembers that now as he approaches the ceremonial tent, and he takes a deep breath as he tries to center himself. Hands and face scrubbed clean and presentable, hair and clothes neatened and purified with a breath of hickory smoke... he is ready.

He scratches on the flap of the tent, and at a word from the acolyte inside, lets himself in. It takes his eyes a moment to adjust from the sunlight outside to the dimness inside - except, of course, that the darkness is not complete. And the figure sitting cross-legged on an elevated pallet of deerskins in the center of the tent is lit now with her own inner light.

If he looks carefully, he  _can_  see Bethy's familiar features underneath - her soft cheeks, her round chin still pudgy with baby fat, her thick dark eyelashes - but they are hard to make out under the overlay of powder blue glow. Her posture, her expression - everything about the way she holds herself is wrong, and when those eyelashes slip open, it is to reveal a swirling vortex of pale blue light.

Garrett takes a deep breath and steps forward, making the ritual gesture. "Hälsningar, andë," he says formally. "Ar välkommen. Hva ar du?"

"I am Peace," the spirit says aloud, and a frission goes up Garrett's spine at the sound of it, the hollow reverberation that seems to shake the fabric of the world. It feels like it's coming from somewhere  _else,_  speaking from behind a paper-thin wall with a boundless space behind it. The spirit turns to fix Bethany's eyes on him, and its expression is cold. "Your instruments of war are not welcome here, mortal boy."

Garrett freezes for a moment, then forces himself to relax, trying not to think too hard about curse words. "...I apologize, I should have left my war knife outside," he says.

"Leave it or bring it. I care not," Peace says. "I do not speak only of your filthy piece of steel. I speak of  _you_. You yourself are a weapon, and you reek of blood." The spirit tilts Bethany's head backwards, as though trying to escape a foul smell.

"I - what?" Garrett is taken aback, thrown unexpectedly on the defensive. Memories spring up vividly in his mind, the grind of metal on metal as his knife slid in the joint between the plates. There's no point in asking the spirit how it knows. "I mean yes, I've killed, but only ever in defense! Only when someone was threatening me, or my family!"

Peace turns its head straight again, making a sound of profound disgust through Bethany's nose. "Humans will always find excuses to wreak violence on each other. It is pathetic," it says. "Over and over again the same patterns play out, the posturing, the provocations, and then violence. And in the end, you end up right back where you started, but with each other's blood soaking in the sand. And is it ever worth it?" It shakes Bethany's head. "Never."

Garrett swallows, trying to overcome an upwelling of dismay. "There are some things that are worth fighting for, surely?" he says tentatively.

"There are none," Peace says flatly. "If a thing cannot be achieved through peaceful means, then it does not deserve to be achieved at all. Preserving the peace is the single highest virtue that mortals can aspire to, and yet so few of them do."

"And if other people who don't aspire to your 'peaceful ways' attack us, we should just what?" Garrett demands, his dismay beginning to edge into anger. "Not defend ourselves? Let them kill us? Let them take all our food and money so my mother and little brother starve? Let them take my dad and my sister off to a prison to die there?"

"If so necessary," Peace pronounces. "It is better to die a virtuous death than to live a life tainted by sin."

 _That's easy for YOU to say,_ Garrett thought furiously, gritting his teeth, _coming from a spirit that doesn't have to actually LIVE in this world. And you can't even die anyway, so what are YOU risking?_

If it read his thoughts behind his tight-pressed lips, the spirit didn't bother to respond to them. "Did you want something, mortal boy?" Peace asked, voice heavy with scorn. "Your presence sickens me."

Garrett knows that, by all etiquette, he should ask now for the spirit's blessing. But he doesn't think he wants it any longer; not for himself, and not for Bethany, who will face so much danger every day in this world just for what she is. The last thing Garrett wants for her - the last thing their father should want for her - is some stuck-up self-righteous visitor in her head teaching her that she should just roll over for every Templar to cross her path. "I just wanted to check on my sister," Garrett says defiantly.

"The girl is fine," Peace says indifferently. It returns to its original position, legs crossed and fists fitted together, and those fiery eyes slip closed. "The teaching goes well. Once she has been cleansed of her childish rage, then she will be worthy to wield magic."

"Fine," Garrett says through gritted teeth. He would tell the spirit now how honored he is to have met it, but the shaman's warning flashes through his mind - It is never wise to lie to a spirit. Instead he turns his back with a stiff motion, and strides out of the tent.  _"Farväl, andë."_

He steps out of the darkness in time to catch the last ray of sunlight full in the face, a blare of golden light that makes him blink and reach up to shield his eyes, scrubbing them against the burn of the light. And it  _is_  the light that burns, he tells himself, not disappointment.

Bethany deserves better than this. Bethany deserves Wisdom, and Justice, and even Pride in herself and her gifts. Bethany deserves those who would defend her, not those who would teach her of her own unworthiness in relation to an abstract ideal. He wishes, more than anything, that their father had been able to find some better teacher for his sister, some better guardian.

Well, he decides. He'll just have to be Valor  _for_  her.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m working off some of my own headcanons of how spirits work, and implementing them onto the Avvar beliefs here – a hopefully more complex and in-depth structure of the spirit world than the Chantry’s “seven good virtues and seven evil sins and that’s it” model. According to the Avvar beliefs, there are a multitude of spirits, and they tend to have multiple facets, both light and dark. Spirits can and will cycle between their light aspects and their dark ones over time (like how Wisdom can become Pride, and Justice can become Vengeance) and the Spirit of Peace that he meets in this story is about two steps off from becoming a Demon of Sloth.


	3. Justice

Kirkwall  
11 Umbralis, 9:31 Dragon

* * *

 

The warden's skin splits open with cracks of glowing white, his eyes fill with pools of fire, the unearthly breath of the Land of Dreams roars outward from his silhouette and fills the space around him. It is the first time since coming to Kirkwall that has felt like coming home.

"You will never take another mage the way you took him!" the spirit voice bellows - and there it is, that thrumming waterfall voice, bringing depth and resonance to this shallow, paper-thin facade of a place. Garrett feels alive, energized - like a breath of winter air in the middle of a sweltering hot summer, to be reminded of the existence of the wider world outside of the miserable, filthy stone walls and pits of this forsaken city.

He is not so fascinated that he forgets where he is, however - the Templars cry out in fear and hatred as their worst enemy manifests before them, and charge with silver shields held high. The spirit responds with a sheet of incandescent fire, and the fight is on.

The warden is the clearest threat, and also the least in danger - his spirit is powerful, and will protect him. But he is not the only mage in danger from the Templars, and Bethany has no such protection. Garrett throws all his will into the fight, into goading and herding and directing the Templars' attention away from the dark young woman in the corner.

When the battle is over, his companions keep their guard up - and Garrett can understand why, even if he knows they are wrong. They do not understand -- the lowlanders never do. The warden stands in the ring of shattered steel, blood and broken bodies littering the Chantry floor, and spirit light still shines through him like the sun seeking its way through the clouds.

This spirit is warlike - events of the last ten minutes made that clear. But it is also controlled - all throughout the fight it sent fire only at their enemies, the Templar, and never once at Garrett or any of his allies. And it is calm now, regarding the carnage around it with a cold dispassionate gaze marked only by the derisive curl of one lip. Not lashing out, not howling with confusion - this spirit must have much experience with the mortal world, Garrett thinks, and thinks it safe to approach.

He makes a show of sheathing his weapons as he walks around into the spirit's line of vision and approaches, stopping a few yards away. He makes the ritual gesture, and speaks the words. "Hälsningar, andë," he says clearly, and opens his hand in a gesture of welcome. "Hva är du?"

The spirit looks confused - looks taken aback, actually, uncertain how to respond. "I am... Justice," it answers after a moment's hesitation. Does it not know the ritual words? "Who are you, mortal, that you approach me so openly? Do you not fear me as the others do?"

"The big glowy scary thing's got a point, Hawke," Varric calls out from the farthest corner he could get. Garrett ignores him.

"Why would I need to fear Justice?" Garrett asks. "I'm not your enemy. I'm a friend of... Anders. You protect him, don't you? His allies are also yours, and so I am yours. And you are welcome among us."

"No, he's not," Aveline hisses from behind her shield. Bethany shoots her a quelling frown as she steps forward, approaching Justice at Garrett's side.

"I did not... expect to find such welcome, among your people," Justice admits, sounding perturbed.

Garrett laughs. "Well, then that just means you haven't met many of  _my_  people," he says. "I am Garrett ar Leandra o Lothering... Kirkwall now, I suppose. This is my sister, Bethany an Leandra o Kirkwall."

"Oh, I should have known," Varric gives a resigned sigh. "Blighted Avvar with their spirit fetishes."

Bethany dips her head a little bit in greeting and respect. "We would ask your blessing, Spirit of Justice," she adds.

"I do not... blessing? That is not..." Justice flounders, and Garrett mentally revises his estimate of the spirit's age. It must be a very young spirit indeed, if this is the first time it has encountered the ritual or supplicants. How did the warden come to host such a spirit? His father always said that lowlander mages didn't take spirit teachers, and that they faced death or worse to even try.

"Anders!" a new voice calls out from the other side of the room, and all at once the spirit fire is quenched, pulled back under the skin of its host body and leaving only the dull firelight behind. The warden blinks himself awake, expression and posture subtly changing as the body returns to human control, bringing lines of worry and age back to a face that moments ago had been fearless and ageless. "What have you done?"

The warden turns to answer his friend, and Garrett's attention turns with him; questions of Justice must be put off to another time.

* * *

 

 _Another time_  comes a week later; after the disaster at the Chantry and the death of his friend the healer had quite literally gone to ground, disappearing among the tunnels and darkness of the Undercity. None of them had made any effort to restrain him, out of respect for his grief and, even more so, respect for his power.

But want and need both drew Garrett and Bethany back to the clinic in the end, reluctant though he is to impose their presence on him so soon after such a loss. They need those maps, and more - his attention has been caught by this renegade healer and his startlingly unexpected breath of the spirit world.

"I suppose I owe you an explanation for what happened in the Chantry that night," the warden - Anders - says, pacing back and forth as he wrings his hands.

"I don't know if you owe me anything, since we weren't able to hold up our end of the deal," Garrett confesses. "But I'd like to hear it, all the same."

Anders takes a deep breath, pressing his palms tight together. "Back when I was with the Wardens, I... met... a spirit of Justice," he says. "He was in our world by accident, trapped in the body of a decaying corpse - he couldn't get back home, and his body was falling apart. It was just a matter of time before he would be... homeless, so to speak. I... offered... to share my body with him, to become his host, so that he wouldn't perish. I swear that's all it was, there were no blood sacrifices, no diabolical deals for power -"

"I should certainly hope there were no blood sacrifices!" Bethany says indignantly, and Garrett agrees. There is no faster way to corrupt a spirit into its darkest aspect than to try to bind one with blood magic. The two forms of magic are the most radical of opposites; spirits are pure creatures of the world beyond, while the power of blood is rooted in the pulse of mortal life, drawing on no mana, no lyrium, touching nothing from the spirit world.

"Look, I know what you must see me as." Anders shakes his head, resumes his pacing, hunching in on himself as the circuit takes him away from them again. "I know all the names. 'Demon.' 'Abomination.' 'Maleficar.' Whatever you're going to say, I promise you I've already said it to myself."

Garrett and Bethany exchange a long look behind the warden's back. Garrett steps up beside Anders, leaning against the wall in his line of sight and shoving his hands into his pocket in a deliberately casual posture. "Actually, the one I was thinking of was 'spirit friend,' " he says.

Anders' head snaps around, and his eyes widen in disbelief. "Wh-what?" he sputters.

"You earned the trust of a spirit of Justice," Bethany chimes in. "That's quite an honor!"

"I..." Anders looks between the two siblings, shaking his head as if to clear it. "What? I don't understand. Aren't you... disgusted? Afraid?"

"No," Garrett says, as Bethany shakes her head. "Our father was Avvar - before he left his clan to be with Mother. He brought us up to show proper respect to the spirit world."

"But..." Anders looks utterly lost.

"When my powers began to show, Father arranged for me to be trained the same way his clan trained him," Bethany volunteers; a bit shy, since the two of them have been taught all their lives that they must keep their spirituality silent and hidden among the lowlanders. "My spirit teacher was Peace."

Garrett scowls at the reminder of that particular creature. "Your spirit teacher was a  _dick_."

"Garrett!" Bethany flashes a scowl at him, too eerily reminiscent of their mother.

"Well, he was!" Garrett counters. "Spirits can be dicks, okay? He tried to tell me that if the Templars came for you I should just  _let them have you_  without a fight! And you expect me to just - "

"Wait, wait," Anders interrupts their sibling banter, thankfully before it can spiral into old bickering. "Bethany, you - you're also a... you also have a spirit?"

"Oh no, not any more," she says quickly. "He left a long time ago, once I had finished learning to control myself. It's the Avvar way of training mages to use their powers. Didn't you know?"

"I... no, I had no idea," Anders admits, sounding lost. "There - there weren't many books about the Avvar at Kinloch Hold. And definitely none that talk about... spirit teachers."

"Well, that figures," Hawke says with a snort. "Self-righteous Andrastean prigs wouldn't want you to learn anything  _useful_  about spirits, don't want their mages to get  _ideas_  that might challenge their magic-hating doctrine."

The lost and desolate look is beginning to give way to something else, like dawn creeping in at the edges of the sky; something a little like curiosity, a little like hope. He looks like a man who has spent years scavenging for scraps among mud and rocks, being ushered freely into a hall where a banquet is set out and waiting – he can’t quite believe it, not yet, but he _wants._

It's a reminder that for all his renegade status, the warden was raised and taught in the confines of the Chant of Light. The Chant reviles spirits, declares them  _good_  and  _evil_  and divides them up into arbitrary categories, as though the spirit world has any reason to bow to the conceit of mortals. Even the 'good' spirits, according to Chantry doctrine, are vehicles for sin and corruption and must be shunned at all costs - up to and including death. How strange and frightening must it be for someone raised in that life to find themselves thrust into the role of augur, with only the Chantry's twisted and flattened notion of spirits to work with, without any training or preparation at all?

This Anders, Garrett reflected, is either extraordinarily brave and compassionate, or else a flaming idiot.

Though he supposes being one doesn't preclude being the other.

"Anyway,  _I_  think it was very brave of you," Bethany says firmly, evidently coming to much the same conclusion. "Being willing to give up so much to help your friend. I'm sure you had nothing but good intentions."

Anders quirks a smile at her, although it's small and wan. "And we all know where good intentions lead us in the end," he says wryly.

"You shouldn't discount what you did," Garrett says quickly, not liking the hollow, self-deprecating tone that lingers under the other man's voice. "Not many people would have been open to something like that - especially not most Andrasteans."

Anders turns the smile on him, and it becomes something more like a wicked smirk. "Oh, I think you'll find I'm open to all  _sorts_  of wicked things," he says with a throaty purr in his voice.

Garrett rocks back on his heels, one eyebrow sliding upwards at the other man's tone. Is this serious flirtation, or is Anders just trying to scare him off? Either way, only one response is possible. "Is that so?" he asks, matching the other man's smirk and tone. "Tell me more. I'm very interested in hearing about  _all_  the wicked things you'd be willing to get up to."

For a moment Anders stares at him, taken aback to have his bait so eagerly swallowed, but then his eyes light up and his lips curl. Before he can riposte, however, Bethany intervenes.

"Oh, Lady spare me," Bethany groans, stepping hastily back so that she is no longer in the line of fire between them. "If you two are just going to be horribly lewd at each other, do it sometime when I'm not around. I'm going back to Uncle's house."

"I'll walk you back," Garrett says quickly; fascinating men with fascinating spirits or no, he can't stand the thought of Bethany running around the streets of Lowtown and Darktown alone. Aside from all the usual risks that attend a pretty girl walking alone in such a lawless city, Bethany would be defenseless against any Templars that crossed her; and conflicts with one could quickly escalate into the other. Bethany makes a face, but doesn't argue.

Garrett sends an apologetic look back over his shoulder at Anders, as the Hawke siblings turn to go. "I'll come and find you another time," he promises. "That is, if you'd like me to...?"

"Please," Anders replies, just a little too quickly and eagerly to be casual. "Or, ah... I don't usually get out of Darktown much, but perhaps I could pay a visit...? I would love for you to tell me more about your family..."

The wistful hunger underlying the words filled in trailed-off silence; _tell me more about this family, this way of life that I've never known, this dream of peaceful coexistence between man and magic, mortal and spirit. Tell me more about mages that aren't confined to Circles, about teachers and students that are not trammeled by Templars._

"I will," Garrett promised that unspoken yearning, and lets a little of his own eagerness heat his eyes. "And I'd love for you to tell me more about your spirit."

"It's a date, then," Anders says brightly, then looks like he wants to bite out his tongue.

"Sure," Garrett says, his lips curling up. "It's a date."

* * *

 

~the end (or the beginning.)

 


End file.
